Fire and Ice
by Not Enough Answers
Summary: In order to predict the future, one must first understand the past. Steve/OC/Bucky
1. Awakening

**So...here is my very first attempt at a Captain America fic (or any Marvel story at all, really). This might be moved into the Avengers category later once more of them start appearing, but for now it'll stay in this section.**

**As you've probably noticed, this is a Steve/OC/Bucky story and the romance(s) will develop a bit later on. I've never written anything like this before, but it's definitely _not _going to be a typical "love triangle". Our protagonist does not, for now, know any more than the readers do, and the mystery will unfold bit by bit. The flashback scenes are written in _italics _and there will be a fair amount of them in the story. Please review/PM me if you have any burning questions! :)**

**Oh, and one last thing: this takes place post-_The Winter Soldier, _but I'm tweaking a few details to make it easier for my planned storyline. Firstly, S.H.I.E.L.D. has not been destroyed completely, but rather forced underground, and still keeps all of its employees. Steve and Sam have not left yet to search for Bucky, Fury has not gone to Europe, and Natasha's identity is still secret. Aside from that, everything else happened as it did in the movie.**

**DISCLAIMER: I'm just playing around with this world and its characters.**

* * *

_**"Some say the world will end in fire,**_

_**Some say in ice.**_

_**From what I've tasted of desire**_

_**I hold with those who favor fire.**_

_**But if it had to perish twice,**_

_**I think I know enough of hate**_

_**To say that for destruction ice**_

_**Is also great**_

_**And would suffice."**_

_**-Robert Frost, "Fire and Ice"**_

* * *

**2014**

She came to on a hard surface, palms pressed against cold metal, eyes squeezed shut against some unknown danger. Inch by inch, feeling began to return to her limbs, and she was mentally aware that she was freezing before she actually felt the temperature.

She remembered nothing. Her mind was a hazy blank, and her first coherent thought was not _Where am I?_, but _Who am I?_

A voice sounded from above her—a deep, booming noise that hurt her ears. She winced and moved her hands up to cover them, but something seized her by the wrists. She briefly struggled against her bonds, but they only tightened and she could feel the blood leaving her fingers.

Panting and breathless, her eyes snapped open for the first time. At first, all she saw was a surge of white light, the change shocking after the dark unconsciousness. It was bright—_too_ bright—and she blinked rapidly, cringing away from it. It took her a long, sluggish moment before she realized that it wasn't actually light, but rather the color of the walls, painted a harsh, unnatural hue like those in a hospital.

She lay still for a long moment, trying to control her breathing and stop the world from spinning around her. The pressure was gradually being released from her wrists, and she sighed in relief as the blood quickly pooled back into her hands. She could feel her heart pumping erratically, and she wondered vaguely if it was really as loud as it sounded to her own ears.

It was only then that she recalled the voice and remembered she was not the only one in the room. She sat up so fast that her muscles screamed in protest and the white walls began to whirl even more crazily. She toppled off the metal table she'd been lying on, but something caught her just before she hit the floor—a pair of scarred, beaten hands that had been seconds ago manacles locking her in place.

She immediately scrambled away on her hands and knees, whirling around and pressing her back against the wall, curling herself up into a ball like a cornered animal. She bit her lip hard so that she wouldn't make a sound, but she was shaking so violently that she almost fell over again.

A figure bent down in front of her, and she was forced to peer at them through her curtain of hair, not wanting to close her eyes again. Her captor was a muscular, dark-skinned man with an eyepatch slung over his left eye. He wore a long, dark jacket that swept the floor and wrapped around him like a bat's wings. He was looking at her every bit as suspiciously as she was glaring at him. She was certain she had never seen him before, but he had an intimidating, authoritative aura. Her fingers instinctively curled into fists, though she knew she would never stand any sort of chance against him.

"Ma'am," he begun slowly, his voice a gruff rumble, and she guessed that he must have been speaking to her when she was on the table, though she hadn't been listening to a word of it. "What is your name?"

She cocked her head slightly to the side. It was a simple enough question, but all she could say was, "I don't know." Her voice was hoarse and cracked to her own ears, and she immediately wished she had made up a false name—it had been the wrong answer.

One dark eye was narrowed at her as the man sized her up, obviously checking for any signs of dishonesty. He was self-assured and businesslike—she guessed that he was someone who was used to being obeyed. What if he tried to torture her? At the thought, her heart sped up again, and she scrabbled uselessly at the floor, her nails digging so deeply into her palms that she felt the skin break.

"Please, sir," she added, her eyes wide. "Where am I? How did I get here?" The question _Who am I? _was again on the tip of her tongue, but she bit it back.

The man glared at her for another long moment, suspicion evident in every line of his body. She could tell he was debating whether or not to answer her. She was shaking again, her teeth chattering loudly against each other.

"My name is Nick Fury, and I am the director of an organization called S.H.I.E.L.D. You were found in a secure cell deep underground sealed in a metallic cylinder. Exhaustive tests and background checks have been performed since your discovery three days ago, and there are no records on you anywhere in the world. No matches for fingerprints, DNA, or facial recognition." His tone was even, but his piercing stare was accusing. He was mistrustful of her, and she found that she couldn't blame him.

"I don't remember anything," she said after a pause. It was the truth. Fury opened his mouth again, but her attention was now focused on the two people who appeared behind him, as quickly and soundlessly as if they had materialized out of thin air. They were both wearing identical, form-fitting navy blue suits. At least they were both slightly less intimidating women: one was a brunette and the other a blonde. She could hear them whispering about her:

"—found her after the Triskelion's collapse—"

"—was buried underground—"

"—nearly pronounced dead—"

"—suspected extreme shock and hysterical amnesia—"

Logically, she knew they were probably correct. She racked her brains, thinking up as many random facts as she could: she spoke English and had a rudimentary gasp of both German and Russian. She knew the basics of mathematics, science, philosophy, and geography. She could name the planets and several constellations. Yes, she knew _how _the world worked—she just didn't know her place in it. She lacked memories and connections. It was as if the part of her that was wholly unique had disappeared, leaving her a blank slate, an empty shell. Who _was_she? She searched frantically for a name, an age, a year—but there was nothing.

Fury sensed that she was beginning to panic again, and barked a command at the two women. The blonde one knelt down and held out a small green pill. "It will calm you," she explained. There was something softer about her, almost kind, and it was that inherent trustworthiness which caused the panicking woman to take the pill from her, wincing as it slowly slid down her dry throat. There was a moment of silence, and then she felt her heart slow, her thoughts clear, and her muscles relax. She slowly leaned back against the wall again and exhaled heavily.

The two women exchanged a glance as the blonde one straightened up. They were speaking to Fury again, but she wasn't paying attention. Without anxiety clouding her thoughts, thinking became easier. A year suddenly popped into her mind, completely unbidden, and she was courageous enough to ask, "It's 2014, isn't it?"

The three of them stopped talking and stared at her; meaningful glances were plainly exchanged between them. Finally Fury said, "Yes, that is correct. It is the tenth of May."

She closed her eyes, allowing herself to take some small measure of relief in the fact that she was not completely lost. There was still information stored in there somewhere. Still, pure facts did not hold any emotion to them. If someone were to hand her a paper detailing exactly who she was and how she came to lose her memory, it would be nothing more than markings on a page. Perhaps she had family, a husband, _children_...but if she couldn't remember them, what was she supposed to do?

"Her condition is stable. Get her changed and bring her to the boardroom. This case is a level four urgency, do you understand me?" Fury ordered the women before he strode out of the room; she saw for the first time that there was a door set into the far corner, not easily visible unless someone was looking for it. She watched him leave as she slowly got to her feet. Her legs felt like they were going to collapse from under her and her throat was uncomfortably dry. She opened her mouth to ask for a glass of water, but the question didn't make it past her lips. She squirmed uncomfortably under the gaze of the other two women: now they were both surveying her like she was a bug under a microscope—something to be scrutinized and examined.

The brunette pursed her lips and turned on one heel; this was obviously not a woman to be crossed. "Please follow me," she instructed, and began to walk toward the door, not turning to see if her orders were being followed.

The other woman, the blonde one, was slightly more approachable. "My name is Sharon Carter, and that is Agent Maria Hill. We have been assigned to help guide you through the interrogation process and your rehabilitation if necessary. If you have any questions or require something, please don't hesitate to ask."

"Agent?" she asked, struggling to make sense of the word's connotations. She suspected she was at some sort of secret governmental base, and judging by the hollow echo of her voice, it was underground. Questions were racing through her mind, but she guessed that neither of the woman had access to any more information than she did. She again considered asking Sharon for a glass of water, but was afraid she would choke on it if she tried to swallow anything more.

Agent Hill was waiting for them at the door, her expression unreadable. She was eerily reminiscent of a drill sergeant, her cold blue eyes holding more than a hint of steel. At least Sharon didn't look as if she assassinated her enemies for a living. The new woman couldn't meet either of their gazes as she followed Agent Hill down a long, white-washed hallway, steel doors with keypads next to them placed every few feet. There was a low hum in the air that took her a moment to realize was electricity. What could be behind the doors that would warrant them being guarded with five thousand volts? Her sense of foreboding only increased.

"Do you...do you often come across...people like me?" she managed to ask once they stopped at the end of the corridor. What she desperately wanted was to ask _Can you_ _help me?_ but her question was already poorly disguised.

Hill regarded her for a long moment. "Your case is certainly unusual, but it is not the strangest we have dealt with," she said briskly. "I suspect Fury will figure out some way to access your memories." She held out a pair of dark jeans and a blue sweater. "Here. You might want to get dressed—you've been wearing that since they discovered you."

For the first time, she glanced down at what she was wearing: an unflattering beige corduroy dress that scratched against her skin. It looked like something out of the previous century. "Oh, right," she said faintly, and took the clothes. "Thank you."

Hill stepped aside to reveal the first door that was not guarded by an electronic keypad and a lethal current of electricity. She shifted the pile of clothes to her other arm and scurried inside, flicking on the light and closing the door behind her.

She vaguely wondered why she hadn't fallen apart yet. Perhaps that part was coming. Now she just felt numb and empty, as if her emotions were dulled. She wondered if it was a side effect of the pill Sharon gave her. At any rate, she was very aware of the two women standing right outside the bathroom, and knew that any panic attack she might have would send them rushing inside. So she slipped into the new clothes, which somehow fit perfectly, and splashed cold water on her face, jerking herself back to alertness. She was careful to avoid looking at herself directly in the mirror until the very end, refusing to admit to herself that she was afraid of what she would see.

Just as she straightened up after wiping her face with a towel, she met her own eyes for the first time. They were round with trepidation and guilt. _Hazel,_ she thought, leaning forward to examine them more closely: not quite brown, but not quite green, either. Her hair, dark brown streaked with a hint of red, was a tangle of knots that fell to the middle of her back, and she guessed by the jagged ends that it had not been cut by a professional. There was a light spattering of freckles across her nose, barely noticeable, but her olive skin was clearer than she would have guessed. She put her height around five foot six and her build was slender with a hint of muscle on her arms and legs. Whoever she was—_had _been—she must have had an active job. Overall, she was both disappointed and relieved to find that she was an average woman in her mid-twenties. There was nothing physically outstanding about her, and even looking at herself she could tell that she would be adept at blending into crowds.

She instinctively reached out to touch the woman in the mirror, but of course her fingers were only met with cool glass. She sighed and turned away, switching off the light and opening the door again. After the relative dimness of the bathroom, it took her eyes a moment to adjust to the bright fluorescent lighting of the hallway again, and another moment to register that Agent Hill and Sharon had been joined by two other people: a pretty woman with red hair and narrowed green eyes, and a tall, muscular blond man. She couldn't see his face at first, but when the group turned towards her she was suddenly struck by a wave of déjà vu so strong that she had to grip the doorknob to stay upright.

She was sure she hadn't seen him since she had woken up, but she recognized him. It was more than that—she _knew_ him. She hadn't felt anything so potent since she had opened her eyes, and she was hit with an overwhelming sense of comfort, so potent that it made her breathless. She was safe.

His mouth opened slightly in apparent disbelief, and his blue eyes were wide with shock. He recognized her, too.

The hallway began to spin again, and the man said a name, but she barely heard it through the rushing noise in her ears. One moment, she was gripping the handle of the door, and the next, she was on the floor staring up at the ceiling. She craned her head to look for the man, but the faces whirling above her were moving too fast. Nausea twisted in her stomach, and she rolled over on her side to retch, but her stomach was empty.

"Tranquilize her," she heard Hill snap, and the redheaded woman bent down to jab a needle into her wrist. She heard the man protest, and with it came that aching sense of familiarity, but it was too late: her vision was going white, and not because of the walls. She slumped down onto the floor again, curling up into a ball to protect herself. Someone's arms went around her and she felt herself being gently lifted off the ground, but her head felt too heavy to move. Her eyes closed of their own accord, and her last thought was of the calming darkness.


	2. Jane

**Thank you to everyone who is reading this story! I'll have the next chapters up quicker, I promise! :)**

* * *

She opened her eyes to another unfamiliar room and a sharp prick in her right arm. Unfortunately, it didn't take her any time at all to remember the events of the past hour, including the fact that she _couldn't _remember anything. _The amnesiac has just remembered that she _is _an amnesiac, _she thought dryly, reaching up her free hand to press her palm against her forehead—an automatic gesture, or so it seemed. She wondered if it was something her old self had used to do, just like she wondered if her internal monologue was hers alone or something her confused brain had made up on the spot.

Bright lights were winking above her, and if she strained her ears hard enough she could hear the hum of electricity buzzing through the wires. Something about this entire scenario was familiar—not the room, but the _situation_. She had been strapped down to a bed before and had been staring up at a tiled ceiling with neon lights shining into her eyes, but it hadn't been when she'd first woken up. Again, the déjà vu had come from sometime _before_. Eager to probe the memories, she closed her eyes, willing herself to remember—

"Jane?" a quiet, slightly strained voice asked from beside her. She immediately jerked upright as her eyes flew open again, wheeling around the room: she was in some sort of infirmary, with a row of beds lining the walls—she appeared to be the only occupant. There were no windows, and her right arm was attached to an IV pole that was dripping a clear liquid into her body. She was propped up on the bed closest to the wall, the sheets soaked with sweat.

Sitting in a plastic chair on her opposite side was the blond man she'd recognized just before she had been knocked unconscious again. He was leaning forward, his eyebrows crinkled together in an expression that looked almost worried, bright blue eyes peering up at her. She allowed herself to feel the momentary sense of relief that came with his presence, so instantaneous and overwhelming that it was something akin to a reflex. _I know you, _she thought hazily, _I just don't know who you _are. And the fact that he was sitting at her bedside proved that he remembered her as well. Her lips curved upward in a smile before she stopped short, recalling the name he had spoken as she was waking up. "What did you call me?"

He hesitated for half a second, as if mentally berating himself for telling her. "Your name is Jane," he said slowly, his eyes so earnest that she couldn't help but believe him. "At least, that's what you were called when I knew you."

She was quiet for a long moment. "And my last name?"

Now he looked even more uncomfortable, clasping his hands together and shifting in his seat. He wore a leather jacket with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, and she noticed that his arms were more muscular than she'd originally thought. "You didn't know," he said, and her heart sank.

"I'm a real-life Jane Doe then," she said, suddenly struck by an awful thought: what if she had always been like this, unable to remember who she truly was? What if there _were _no memories to recall? She didn't know if there were any types of amnesia that caused the sufferer to have recurrent episodes. So as not to dwell on that possibility, she remarked, "Now if only I knew your name."

"I apologize, ma'am," he said gallantly, straightening up at once. "My name is Steve Rogers."

"Otherwise known as Captain America," a coolly amused voice sounded from the doorway. Jane's head snapped around as her eyes landed on the red-haired woman who had jabbed the needle into her arm, and she automatically stiffened. The woman smirked as if she could read her mind as she sauntered into the room, her arms crossed over her chest. "But of course he's far too old-fashioned to brag about it."

"Natasha," Steve said in what sounded like a warning tone. Jane's eyes flickered back and forth between them in confusion.

The woman called Natasha didn't seem fazed; she strode to the end of Jane's bed and stared down at her with those catlike eyes. "When she's able to walk, Fury wants her to meet everyone in the boardroom," she announced, sounding bored. "Listen, I bet you're waiting for me to apologize for tranquilizing you, but I won't," she drawled. "I was just following orders."

"And we both know there's nothing more you love to do," Steve shot back.

Natasha's eyes glittered as she turned her gaze to him. "Well, I have to keep my reflexes sharp somehow. By the way, Sam wants you to call him back."

The change in Steve's demeanor was palpable; he immediately straightened up, glancing up from Jane to stare at the woman. "What else did he say?"

She shrugged. "Nothing, really. Just that he thinks there's no reason to leave Washington. That _he's _still here."

So at least Jane knew she was in Washington, D.C. Being able to geographically pinpoint her location gave her a small amount of comfort. Something tugged at the edges of her memory, but it was little more than a faint wisp, gone as soon as it had come.

Beside her, Steve had gone rigid; Jane saw his knuckles whiten. "Why are _you_ here, Natasha?" he asked, a slight edge to his voice.

"To pass on Sam's message, of course," she replied, her eyes widening in false innocence. Jane idly wondered if they were flirting, or if Natasha was just putting on a show. "And besides, I was just as curious to see her as the next person. She's been the talk of S.H.I.E.L.D. since they found her."

Jane shifted uncomfortably in the blankets, the IV bottle swinging slightly. "What is S.H.I.E.L.D., anyway?" she asked. "Where is this place?"

Natasha reached into her jacket and pulled out a thick manila envelope, dropping it onto the bedside table. "These files will explain it better than I can," she answered. "In case you're wondering, Fury isn't bothered about telling you all this because it's not likely you'll be allowed to leave for a while."

"I'm not allowed to leave?" Jane demanded. She felt her pulse speed up again. "But—"

"You were found in a container under S.H.I.E.L.D.'s headquarters—or what's left of it," Natasha said cryptically. "It's probably safe to say that your location was no accident."

Jane fidgeted with the edge of the blanket, hoping her discomfort didn't show on her face. Her mind was whirling with questions, none of which she had the answers to at the moment. She looked back and forth between Steve and Natasha warily. Could she trust any of them? Even if she did regain her memories, would they even let her leave? There was no denying the spark of recollection that Steve's face brought her, but was that enough for blind trust? Still, Jane told herself, there was no use mulling over it. She had no choice. She was the one trapped in an underground bunker and strapped to a hospital bed.

"Relax," Natasha said, apparently noticing her distress. "They'll want to experiment on you and see if your memories come back. There really are no better people for the job. I expect you'll be fine within a week or two. Of course, what happens to you then is up for debate…"

"Nat," Steve said wearily, and dragged his hand over his face. For the first time, Jane saw that he looked exhausted: there were dark purple circles under his eyes and his clothes were rumpled, as if he had slept in them several times in a row. "I don't think terrifying her is what Fury had in mind."

The other woman's lips pursed in apparent annoyance. "What makes you think Fury sent me?"

"I wasn't aware you were such a calming bedside presence," Steve shot back. Jane's head swiveled back and forth as she watched their banter, utterly baffled and slowly sinking back into her pillows.

"Fine, Rogers. Fury wanted someone else to be there when she woke up in case she panicked again. Sharon offered—" here Steve tensed even more, "—but I wanted to see her for myself." She fixed her unyielding gaze on Jane. "And of course I had to pass on Sam's message. He wants to talk to you as soon as possible."

"Sam. Right." Steve began to stand up, but met Jane's eyes again and sank back down into the chair. "Can he wait? I haven't told Jane anything yet."

"Don't worry about me, Captain Rogers," Jane said quickly, feigning a smile. "I doubt I'll be going anywhere soon. I just wanted to ask you one question: Who am I?"

He didn't meet her gaze. His shoulders were hunched and his head bowed as he replied, "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Is that a challenge?" she asked. "You know more about me than I do. I don't know who Captain America is, but I recognize your face. I just wish I could remember who you are."

He smiled, but from her angle it looked more like a grimace. "So do I," she heard him say, very quietly. "Goodbye, Jane." He finally did stand up from his chair and strode out of the room, pausing only to give Natasha a loaded glance. His eyes moved over Jane's form once more, and she thought she saw a muscle in his jaw clench, before he quietly slipped out of the room.

"He'll be back soon," Natasha said, obviously noticing the way Jane's eyes followed him all the way out. "He would have put up more of a fuss if it hadn't been so urgent." She did not move to vacate the chair Steve had left; she merely took another step forward, her arms crossed and her expression guarded. Jane noticed that she was wearing a delicate silver chain around her neck, a tiny arrow dangling just above her collarbone.

"Listen," Natasha began, "I wanted to speak to you about Steve. I don't know why he recognized you, but I do know that you're somehow connected with his past. He told me once that he's only ever loved three people—that he would die for any of them if he had to." She pursed her lips, considering. "Then again, that's not much coming from Steve. He would sacrifice himself trying to save a fly."

Jane ignored her last remark. "And you think I'm one of them?"

"He carried you here and didn't leave your side until now. What do you think?" Natasha's tone was flat; it was impossible to tell what she was thinking. "I don't know who you are, but…" she paused, sounding more pensive than uncertain. "I owe Steve. The least I can do is make life a bit easier for him."

"I don't know," Jane said dryly, again glancing back at the door. "He seems like the kind of person who purposely makes things difficult."

For the first time, Natasha seemed to relax, and she gave Jane something that was close to a smile. "Sounds like you did know him after all," she replied. "Everything you need to learn about him is in those files. The serum made his body nearly indestructible, but it couldn't protect his mind."

Jane had no idea what she was supposed to say in answer to that. Putting aside the fact that she had no idea what serum Natasha was talking about, she was a bit irritated at the other woman's warning tone; it wasn't as if she'd _asked _to have her memories wiped. How could she hurt someone without even knowing what she'd done wrong? So in order to avoid answering, she asked, "Who are the other two people he loved? Assuming I'm one of them, of course."

Natasha's smile grew thin. "You'll find out eventually," she said, and snatched a needle from her inside pocket. Before Jane could protest, Natasha stuck it inside the tube feeding into her arm. Jane watched in horror as another liquid slowly seeped into her veins. As soon as it entered into her bloodstream, she could feel the heavy fatigue beginning to close on her again. She reached for the tube, trying to rip it out of her skin, but Natasha's hand was holding down her wrist before Jane even moved, reminding her of Fury's actions when she first awoke. She was completely powerless.

"It's just morphine," Natasha said into her ear as Jane's struggles grew weaker. "I don't usually do this. Fury's orders," she said, looking as if she was very much enjoying some inside joke. "You'll wake up in a couple of hours, don't worry."

"Don't you think I've had enough sleep?" Jane muttered. She had just enough time to see Natasha's triumphant smirk before she again fell into an uneasy slumber.

* * *

_**1992**_

_She was sitting cross-legged on a worn blanket spread across a yellowed patch of grass, clutching a glass of water. She instinctively knew that she was very young, and her hair was pulled into two braids that scratched against her skull. The shade of a palm tree spread out before her, and colorful birds flew in and out of the branches. She watched them in delight, shrieking when a parrot swooped low over her head. Her vision was fuzzy at the corners, but she could tell that she was in a fenced property, the brick wall towering at least a dozen feet high. There was a small sod house to her right, the windows little more than indentations in the dirt, but despite the bedraggled look of the house and backyard, she was blissfully happy in the way that only a small child could be. The desert sun was scorching and relentlessly beat down onto the back of her neck._

_A man walked into her field of vision then, emerging from the house with a scroll tucked under his left arm—Jane could see it was covered in blue lines through the thin reed. He wore a dirtied shirt and jeans, running his fingers through his thick, unkempt beard. There was a haunted look about his dark eyes, but the toddler-Jane did not notice this. She leapt to her feet excitedly, spilling her glass of water in her haste to rush to the man. He bent down and gathered her up easily in one arm, the heaviness to his eyes lifting as he kissed the top of her head. He was speaking in a language Jane didn't understand, but she was more than happy to snuggle in the man's arms and loop her arms around his neck, content just to be with him._

* * *

She awoke gasping, the sheets tangled around her waist and her arms crushing her pillow. The memory of the dream felt so _real_—more substantial than the shadowy twilight she found herself in. The infirmary was dark and quiet, the lights dimmed and the door closed to give the illusion of night, though Jane had absolutely no idea what time it really was. She wondered when Natasha had left and if Steve had come back only to find her unconscious yet again.

There was a piece of bread with cheese and an apple sitting on her bedside table. Jane hadn't realized how hungry she actually was until seeing food; she had no idea how long it had been since she'd last eaten. Carefully sitting up and untangling the blankets from her legs, she picked up the plate and devoured the food hungrily, glad there was no one around to witness her attacking it like a starving animal. When it was empty—even the crumbs had been eaten—Jane stared around the empty room. There was something almost eerie about the beds stripped of linen and the windowless space, as if she was in some sort of a military hospital. Perhaps S.H.I.E.L.D. was a secret government base: it would make sense seeing as how she was in Washington. But even if that was the case, it still didn't answer any of Jane's crucial questions: Who was she, and how had her memory been erased? How had she gotten to be trapped in a metal tube deep underground, unconscious for an undetermined period of time? And the most important one: Would she ever get her memory back?

Heart racing, she leaned forward and pulled the IV tube out of her arm, rubbing at the sore spot and getting to her feet. Her only comfort now was knowing that at least she had snatches of memories, even if she didn't have the entire picture. She thought again of the man in her dream and the rugged landscape, the shoddy house. She didn't think that she was so creative as to make up something that detailed, so she would have to assume that it was a broken bit of memory resurfacing again. And that must mean she had more, right? If what Natasha had said was true, then S.H.I.E.L.D. would be able to help her retrieve them. What if the man was her father? She'd definitely been in a desert, but it could have been anywhere from the Middle East to New Mexico. She had nothing to go on aside from a vague description of a tanned male and a small, scraggly backyard.

Jane ran her hand through her messy hair and took an experimental step forward, relieved when her legs didn't wobble. Her mind was racing with her recent dream and she kept replaying her conversations with Steve and Natasha. She had been unconscious more than not since she'd been awoken, and it would be next to impossible for her to go back to sleep again, but she didn't fancy spending any more time in the infirmary. She would explore her surroundings a bit and see if she could find any clues that explained what kind of an organization S.H.I.E.L.D. was. If she ran into anyone, she would just say that she'd gotten lost—it wouldn't be a lie, after all.

She half-expected the door to be locked, and was pleasantly surprised when it swung open under her touch. Cautiously stepping forward, she found herself in a nondescript hallway, completely identical to the one she remembered from the day before. There was nothing about the corridor that gave away its location—she could be in a school or an ordinary office, if she ignored the steel doors.

Jane had only reached the opposite corner when she glimpsed movement in her peripheral vision—a human figure standing perfectly still at the other end of the hallway. A long moment passed, and the other person didn't move, though Jane was sure they were staring straight at her. Just as she was about to retreat, they took a step forward and began to stride in her direction.

Stifling a gasp, she ducked back the way she had come and broke into a run, her curiosity suddenly leaving her. She only realized that she didn't know the combination for the infirmary when she came to the keypad next to the door. She was locked out.

Whirling back around, she saw that she was still being pursued. The figure was much taller than her, dark brown hair falling over his eyes and obscuring his face from view. He wore black clothes, a heavily padded jacket, and his left arm appeared to be made completely of metal; a red star was emblazoned just below his shoulder. But that wasn't what terrified Jane: he was carrying a gun, and she heard a loud click as the safety was released.

She was sprinting away before her brain caught up with her, the doors and walls blending into one continuous blur. Jane didn't turn around to see if she was being pursued—her fight or flight instincts had finally caught up with her, and she'd chosen flight.

She skidded around the corner so fast that she hit the opposite wall, her hands reaching out to brace herself against the impact. As soon as she'd recovered herself, she was off again, having spotted a stairwell ahead of her. Her heart dropped when she heard footsteps behind her, and prepared to duck if she heard gunshots. She prayed for someone—anyone—to rescue her. Some instinct told her that the man was not friendly. What if this had been S.H.I.E.L.D.'s plan all along?

Jane leapt onto the staircase and took the steps two at a time, pushing her legs forward as fast as they could go. A slow burn had started in her calves, but she forced herself to ignore it as she fled, praying that raw adrenaline alone would be enough to get her out of danger. She just had to find a way outside—

"_Stop running," _someone growled from behind her, and Jane was suddenly thrown forward, losing her balance and tumbling to the floor. She threw her arm out in a blind punch, but a hand grabbed her shoulder with almost superhuman strength and twisted it backward. She cried out and tried to struggle, but she'd forgotten she was so close to the stairs. Her foot caught on the railing and the floor suddenly disappeared from under her as she fell. The ground was solid concrete, and Jane barely had time to comprehend that she'd flipped right over the railing or prepare herself—

And then her pursuer was suddenly under her, not making a sound as she landed again in his grasp, her knee painfully slamming onto his metal arm. She winced, unable to move, as he carried her down the remainder of the stairs before dropping her unceremoniously on the ground. Despite her injured knee, Jane was somehow still able to scramble to her feet, but there was nowhere to run. He had her cornered.

"Please don't hurt me," she panted, searching for some sort of reprieve in his gray eyes. There didn't appear to be any. "What do you want?"

He simply stared at her, and Jane had absolutely no idea what he could be thinking. If he wanted to kill her, why hadn't he done so already? Why not let her smash into a bloody pulp on the stairs instead of catching her? Instead he was silent, his eyes boring into hers as if he was examining her.

Jane's attention automatically drifted to the gun he still carried in his hand. Her mind crazed with fear and adrenaline, she leapt at it and tried to twist it out of his weaker arm, hoping to wrench it out of his grasp and take it for herself.

But he was infinitely faster and stronger than her: Jane's back slammed against the wall as his metal arm smashed into the plaster inches from the side of her head. She screamed and kicked out blindly, but he pulled her leg out from under her and she toppled over, landing hard on her back. He pinned her arms to the floor as he hovered above her, his knees digging into her sides and making escape impossible. This close, she could see dark stubble lining his jaw, and violet shadows under his eyes that reminded her of Steve's.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he said, as if pinning women down to the floor whilst holding a gun was something he did every day. His American accent startled even Jane, who hadn't expected him to have such an ordinary-sounding voice. "I just saved you. All I want are answers."

"But I don't have any," she panted. His face was whirling above her, and she sensed a panic attack coming on. "I don't know—what you're talking about. I don't work here."

His eyes narrowed. "Then who are you?"

"I don't know," Jane whimpered again. "I was in the infirmary—they woke me up yesterday."

"Your memories are erased?" the man asked, and his grip loosened on her. The muscles in his face relaxed somewhat, the suspicion in his eyes turning to curiosity. Jane concentrated on taking deep, even breaths.

"Maybe," she said, voice shaking. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is trying to help me regain them. All I know is that my name is Jane."

At this, the man released his grip on her completely and got to his feet easily, but Jane stayed sitting, her entire body sore. All the fight had gone out of her. She was still reeling from her near-death experience falling over the railing. The man shook his hair out of his eyes and looked down at her lying on the ground. He had the same intent stare again, as if he was analyzing her. He was dangerous—she wasn't that naïve—but there was something _lost _about him, as if he was a guard dog who no longer had orders. But most of all, she recognized his expression, because it was the same one she knew she wore.

"I knew you," he whispered after a moment, his lips barely moving. Jane stared up at him, lost for words. She searched for some sort of recognition in his face, and found none at first, but when he twisted the side of his mouth upward in what could have been the ghost of a grimace, she thought there was something familiar about him: it wasn't the instant recognition she'd had with Steve, but something far more subtle—the imprint of a memory rather than the memory itself.

The creak of a door opening sounded from above them, and before Jane could even blink, the mysterious man had disappeared without so much as a trace that he'd ever been there at all. Jane was left with the memory of his gray eyes boring into hers as she leaned her head back against the wall again, resting her throbbing head on the cool concrete.

Footsteps rang on the stairs above her, and Jane wearily glanced up when she heard a worried voice say her name. Steve Rogers and Sharon Carter were hurrying towards her, Steve wearing the same rumpled leather jacket and Sharon in a pencil skirt and cream-colored blazer. Steve knelt down beside her at once while Sharon took her wrist, feeling for her pulse. Jane didn't try to resist.

"What happened? Why are you out of your room?" Steve asked. He reached out and put a hand on her shoulder, seeing that her arm was twisted at an awkward angle. Jane mentally cursed herself for once again noticing the way the tendons flexed under his skin.

"Her vitals are fine," Sharon murmured. "She appears to be in shock. Good thing Fury wasn't the one who found her or she'd be in lockdown for weeks."

Jane's head was beginning to feel fuzzy, as if her thought process was slowing down. She wanted to tell Steve about the dream she'd had, to let him know that her memories might be coming back, but decided then was hardly the proper time to explain. "I…I left the infirmary to look around and someone began chasing me. They left when they heard you…"

Steve's hand froze from where it had been examining her shoulder. "Who was it?" he said, though the tautness in his voice suggested he knew exactly who it was. Sharon shot him a slightly alarmed glance.

There was an honesty and openness about Steve that was impossible to deny, but Jane still hesitated. For all she knew, the man who had chased her was merely a setup to gauge her reaction. "How do I know I can trust you?"

Sharon lightly placed a hand on Steve's elbow, and he looked over at her. Something stirred in the pit of Jane's stomach, but she wasn't interested in pursuing the reasons behind it. "Show her the picture," she instructed, as if they had prepared for just this reaction.

He nodded and reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, handing a small rectangular piece of paper out to Jane. The edges of the photograph were worn and yellowed, but the black-and-white image was clear. It was little more than a picture of three people standing against the backdrop of a shady forest path lined with oak trees, but it felt to Jane as if the universe had collapsed in on itself.

The first boy, the one on the left, was unmistakeably Steve himself; even an utter stranger would be able to recognize it. But the Steve in the picture looked much shorter and skinnier than the one kneeling before Jane—there was a sickly pallor to his face and his clothes were falling off him, the sleeves on his button-down shirt rolled up at the cuffs. He was even shorter than her, which certainly wasn't the case with the real Steve.

The second boy was taller and bulkier, his face classically handsome. Even in the faded picture, his eyes were alight with life, and there was a half-smirk on his face, as if he was in on a secret only he knew about. He looked as if he was wearing some sort of military uniform.

And the girl standing between them was unmistakably Jane.

She caught the edge of some whispered conversation between Sharon and Steve, but she didn't bother to listen to it. With shaking hands, she flipped the picture over, tearing her eyes from her own face, before reading the script printed on the back of the photograph:

_Steven Rogers, James Buchanan Barnes, and Jane, surname unknown. New York City, 1943. _

Yet again, the world she thought she had known turned upside down. Jane stared at the man in the picture; he had a self-confident, almost arrogant air to him, the complete opposite of Steve's slouched, diminutive posture. And yet...how was it even _possible?_ "James Buchanan Barnes," she read aloud, her thumb smoothing out a fold in the picture. "I saw him."

Steve's eyebrows pulled together slightly. "You mean you remember him?"

She shook her head. "No. Am I supposed to remember him? I mean I saw him. Here. Today."


	3. SHIELD

Jane sat on the edge of her bed, the thick S.H.I.E.L.D. folder Natasha had given her lying open on her lap. It had been nearly a day since she had woken up in Washington, and she was still no closer to finding any answers than she had been as soon as she'd opened her eyes.

Although she was now up-to-date on what exactly the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division _was_—an intelligence agency that had recently been forced underground due to its twisted mirror image, Hydra—she still had no idea what exactly they _did. _She had only been given the declassified information. Apparently, the leak several weeks beforehand had not spilled all of the agency's secrets. Ironically, Jane suspected she could get just as much information with a simple Internet search.

She'd been poring over the files for hours, trying to work out exactly what could have brought her to this place. Apparently, the organization's headquarters—the Triskelion—had been destroyed by a helicarrier during a fight between Captain America—Steve—and a Hydra assassin known as the Winter Soldier. Many of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secrets had been leaked to the world, but though it was believed to have been disbanded, the agency was still working underground—literally. At first, Jane had wondered if she'd been an agent who was buried during the fight, but the cell they'd found her in and the container were deliberately placed, not to mention that she couldn't be found on any of their records. So at least she knew she had ties to S.H.I.E.L.D. somehow. It and Hydra possessed technology that far surpassed anything that was public knowledge, but what was the point of burying _her? _Had she been part of an experiment that had gone wrong, thus erasing her memories?

Steve had told her on the way back to the infirmary that Fury and the other top-level agents were searching for ways that could possibly retrieve her memories, but Jane knew the truth: S.H.I.E.L.D. was only spending so much time on her because they thought she might have crucial information about them. If she hadn't had memory loss, if she'd been able to explain why she was there and given them all they needed to know, they would likely have sent her back out into the world after signing dozens of nondisclosure agreements. Was there any hope for that outcome now, or was she doomed to a life of whitewashed walls and fluorescent lights and memories that were nothing more than faint sparks in the back of her mind?

She flipped over the page she'd been studying, a brief summary of what was known as the Battle of New York which had occurred two years previously—the name sparked a vague recognition, and Jane had folded the corner of that paper over with her thumb for later examination—and a large, full-color picture of Steve jumped out at her. She'd studied _his _file several times over, but had been unable to glean anything more from it. Aside from now knowing small details, like his birthday (the Fourth of July) and his birthplace (Brooklyn) she was no closer to understanding anything than she had been before. The file was primarily focused on his involvement with S.H.I.E.L.D. rather than him as an individual, anyway. Jane studied another picture of him with the Avengers, of which Steve was a member. _Captain America,_ Natasha had called him. A smile quickly darted over Jane's face as she studied his appropriately patriotic, star-spangled costume, but it immediately disappeared when she saw the next file waiting to be read.

_James Buchanan Barnes_, it boldly stated in large block letters, and as Jane lifted the paper to her face, a photograph fluttered out onto the floor. She leaned over to pick it up and her eyes landed yet again on her own face. She'd shoved the picture Steve had given her into the envelope as soon as she could—she didn't like to look at it for any longer than was necessary, as it only brought her another slew of questions she didn't understand. Of course, it would explain why she had recognized Steve, but how on _earth _could she be from the year 1943? And how could she, Steve, and this James Barnes all be alive seventy years later while barely looking older than they did in the picture?

Granted, Steve's S.H.I.E.L.D. file _had_ said he was born in 1918. Jane thought it had been a mistake at first, unless he was blessed with very, _very _good genes—but that still didn't explain the man Jane had encountered in the stairwell, or, most importantly, Jane herself. Was she _from _the nineteen-forties, just like Steve and James? They'd obviously known each other back then. But then how was it that she knew so much about the twenty-first century and how the world worked now while only having a vague knowledge of the forties?

Frankly, the entire situation was giving Jane a massive headache. She forced herself to abandon that particular mystery for the time being and glanced down again at James's file—it appeared to be much thicker than the others. She had a sudden flashback of falling through empty air, his metal hand at her throat, and a wave of cold nausea swept over her. He'd said that he wouldn't hurt her, and indeed he even appeared to remember her, but the icy fear dropped into her stomach all the same. He set her on edge, and Jane suddenly found herself wishing for Steve's comforting presence and warm smile. He was the best thing she had to a memory at this point, and Jane had the feeling he could put anyone at ease.

A knock at the door had her quickly snapping the file shut and stuffing it under her pillow rather than tossing it back onto the table; she didn't want the new arrival to see that she'd been staring at Captain America's square-jawed, indecently handsome face that looked as if it belonged on the cover of a magazine rather than working as, rather ironically, a shield.

Jane immediately froze at her train of thought—it was completely different to anything else she had thought thus far. The snarky voice in the back of her mind was gone as soon as it had come, and she was left to wonder if it had been a fragmented piece of her old self trying to break through. "Come in," she called, forcing the shocked expression off her face. She didn't want to drag anyone else into her identity crisis.

She was so certain that it was the security guard now stationed outside her door after the stairwell incident—though Jane was sure it was just as much to keep her inside as it was to keep other people out—that she nearly jumped up in fright when she saw Steve's tall, lean frame walking towards her. She was eternally grateful that she'd thought to hide the file, and hoped he wouldn't notice her oddly-shaped pillow. She leapt to her feet at once, her mind swimming with all the information that had been crammed into it during the past day.

Steve smiled when he saw her—it was a wide, honest smile that lit up his entire face, but it was sweetly sad as well, almost rueful. "How are you feeling, ma'am?" he asked her. "I want to apologize for what happened earlier—"

"It's not your fault," Jane insisted for the umpteenth time. Steve had gotten it into his head that he was somehow accountable because she'd nearly been attacked in the stairwell, despite the fact that she hadn't, technically, been injured, and that it had been her own fault for wandering around the corridors on her own. She felt sorry for whoever hadn't locked the infirmary door and presumably gotten an earful from Fury, and she herself was just waiting to be punished for what she had tried to do. They probably had the entire place bugged anyway—it wasn't as if she stood any chance against them on her own if she wanted to leave.

"I know you have a lot of questions," he said now, stopping just in front of her with his hands loosely in his pockets.

Jane took a deep breath. "Yes," she answered carefully. She thought about the voice in the back of her head that was currently keeping up a sarcastic monologue of their conversation, and asked, "Am I…am I the same person I was before, when you knew me?"

Steve's gaze immediately turned solemn. "Yes and no," he said. "You're quieter and more hesitant now—you used to never stop talking."

"You don't exactly look the same yourself, Captain," she teased, finally giving in to the nagging voice.

He grimaced, looking almost pained, as if the name bothered him. "Please call me Steve."

"Please call me Jane," she retorted. "It's the closest thing I have to an identity right now."

"Fine," Steve said, and allowed himself a small smile. "_Jane. _When I knew you, you were very…impulsive. You were always more like…" He trailed off and abruptly cleared his throat. "But you're resilient. I know you'll come out of this just fine."

"I was like James Barnes, right?" she asked quietly; the air had suddenly become charged. "The other man in the picture. The one who chased after me. I knew him, too."

Steve nodded slowly, his blue eyes fixed on hers. "Bucky," he said. "Have you read his file?"

"Not yet," Jane admitted. "But the three of us were friends. You've been looking for him. That's why you were so curious to know what had happened to me. How did all of three of us make it…_here?" _She made a grand sweep of her arm, indicating not just the room, but the date and location.

"I'm sorry—I can't tell you anything more," Steve said with a sheepish grin. "I've already said too much. I promised Fury I wouldn't reveal anything else to you."

"So why are you here?" Jane asked. She didn't mean for the question to sound as rude as it did, but luckily Steve appeared not to take offense.

"I came to take you to Fury," he said, and offered his hand to her. Jane stared at it dumbly for a long moment, uncomprehending, before she realized he was being polite. She reached out and grasped his hand, and he pulled her to her feet with seemingly no effort. His hand was large and warm, easily wrapping around hers, and he looked marginally more awake than he had earlier. Jane wondered what time it really was; since there were no clocks she had no concept of either night or day.

The guard standing at the door immediately snapped to attention when Steve passed and gave a prompt salute. Steve nodded at him and he relaxed, Jane watching the entire exchange with curiosity.

"What is this place, anyway?" she ventured to ask as they set off down the corridor. For such a large man, Steve moved soundlessly, like a ghost, while Jane's footfalls echoed loudly off the walls.

"S.H.I.E.L.D.'s underground facility, made for use if the Triskelion was ever compromised." He sounded as if he was reciting a pre-prepared answer. "It has all of the requirements needed to keep the organization running, but the number of agents has been significantly reduced."

"You're sure Hydra can't get in here?" Jane asked, half-jokingly and hoping to convey that she'd done her research. "Or what's left of it, at least."

To her relief, she was rewarded with a slight smile. "Positive," Steve assured her. "Only the most trusted agents remain. Fury made sure of that."

_Speak of the devil, _Jane thought wryly as they turned a corner and came face-to-face with the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. himself. Fury was standing in the middle of the hallway with his arms crossed, looking like he was blocking their path. He was flanked by Agent Maria Hill and Sharon. Maria's steely gaze moved from Steve to Jane and lingered on her; Jane thought she saw the other woman's lips thin out into a narrow line, as if she was displeased by something.

"Cap," Fury greeted him, but he continued to scrutinize Jane; she felt as if she had shrunk under the weight of his stare. "Jane."

"Hello, sir," she mumbled, trying not to stare at his patch over his left eye.

"I heard about your escape attempt earlier today," he said. Jane opened her mouth to stammer out an excuse, but to her amazement she thought she saw the hint of amusement on his face. "You performed exactly as I expected."

"What do you mean?" Jane asked, glancing back and forth between Steve and Fury. "The door was unlocked on purpose?"

Steve looked apologetic, hanging his head down like a kicked puppy. He began to speak, but Fury interrupted him before he could get a word out. "Do you think we would risk S.H.I.E.L.D.'s security by one unlocked door? I applaud your efforts, but you had no chance of escaping."

"For now," Steve added, although his reassurance rang hollow. His face was like an open book: he wasn't _trying_ to lie, but he was deluding himself.

So Jane _had _been a lab rat. They'd wanted to see what she would do. Her eyebrows raised, and she turned to Steve. Unease bubbled up in her chest; her previous sense of security was being chipped away at the edges. "Then what was the point of sending James—Bucky—in after me?" she asked.

Fury's face turned grave. "That's the problem," he said. "It was _not _part of the plan."

"But he's with you, isn't he?" Jane asked, pointing at Steve. "He's your friend. Why would he—"

"It's a long story," Maria interjected; her voice was hard. "Nick, we should make a decision soon."

Fury nodded once and turned back to Jane. "My point is, even with Barnes's skills, something should have alerted his presence to us—"

"Unless someone let him in," Sharon finished grimly.

Now Jane felt the heat of all four gazes on her face. She stared at them blankly, trying to reconcile their suspicion with Steve's guilt—what did _she _have to do with Barnes? Did they think she let him in only to subsequently run away?

And then the answer hit her: Fury suspected she was an undercover Hydra agent sent to infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D.'s new headquarters. "No—I promise I had nothing to do with it," she said, but faltered when she realized that her word was all she could give them. There was no way to conclusively prove that she was telling the truth.

"I trust Jane," Steve interjected, his voice steady and sure. "I understand your caution, sir, but—"

Whatever trace of leftover amusement there had been on Fury's features suddenly vanished. He barked, "Captain, the goddamned _Winter Soldier _got into here, and you're accusing me of being _cautious?" _

"The Winter Soldier?" Jane gasped. "But—James Barnes is the Winter Soldier?"

"Haven't you read the S.H.I.E.L.D. file?" Maria asked her, a hint of derision underlying her tone. But Jane didn't care. She was too busy processing the fact that she had been pursued and subsequently spared by a dangerous, lethal assassin…an assassin who had obviously known her and Steve. And yet again, the world tied itself into yet another unsolvable knot. She had to grip the sides of her head to keep the world from spinning again. She heard Steve's worried voice in her ear, and Sharon put a hand on her shoulder. She knew Fury and Maria were both staring at her, probably assessing her to see if she was lying or not.

"Does she need a medic?" Steve asked. "I can get—"

"No," Jane answered before anyone else could, lifting her head and staring Fury squarely in the eyes. "I'll be fine. I just need a moment to process everything."

Fury inclined his head forward once in what could have been an assent and turned back to Steve. "Regardless of whether you once knew her or not, things have changed. After all the recent events, it is best that she is treated like any other unknown. I placed you in charge of her care because I trust you, but we've already seen that she will make an attempt to escape." Fury's one visible eye was narrowed at him. "I called you down to the boardroom so we could investigate this matter further." He paused before adding, "Whatever happens after this is all on you, Rogers."

Steve nodded once; a muscle in his jaw was working furiously. "I understand, sir."

"Steve—" Sharon began to say, moving forward as if to comfort him, but Maria stopped her. She said something in a low voice, and Sharon fell silent.

"I'm sorry," Jane said quietly to him as Fury tuned around and disappeared through a set of heavy steel doors. "I wouldn't have tried to leave if I'd known." _S.H.I.E.L.D. is the best place for me to be right now, _she told herself as firmly as she could.

Steve smiled at her. "It's not your fault. We're unequipped for situations like these, anyway."

But his words didn't pacify Jane one bit. She anxiously chewed the inside of her cheek as they entered a small but cluttered room with one long wooden table dividing the middle. Cameras were set in every corner, each with an unblinking red eye. Jane tried not to look at them as she took a seat at the end of the table. Along with Fury, Maria, Steve and Sharon, there were several more S.H.I.E.L.D. agents already present, every one of them looking grave. Jane felt their eyes on her, and she could have sworn that a pair of them began to whisper amongst themselves. Steve sat down on her left side, shooting her a quick reassuring smile, with Sharon taking the seat on his opposite side. The door closed with an ominous finality; Jane saw that Natasha Romanoff was standing on the other side of the room, her arms crossed and looking coolly disinterested.

"Now, for the purposes of this discussion, we will refer to you as Jane, unless you wish to be called something else," Fury said, folding his hands together and staring down the table at her.

"Jane is fine," she replied, cursing herself when she heard her voice waver. _Jane Doe. _The standard name for an unknown female. She had no identity and no past aside from several shadowy memories and the blond man sitting next to her.

Fury pressed a red button on the wall and a glowing screen immediately lit up behind him, though Jane could see no projector. It took her a moment to realize that it was displaying pictures of _her_, lying flat in a coffin-shaped box that was just large enough for her body, without even a pillow. The top looked to be metallic and was curved upward in an open position. The walls appeared to be made of solid concrete and the ceiling had caved in, leaving chunks of rock and rubble scattered on the ground. There was nothing else present aside from Jane and the mysterious coffin.

"This is where we found you," Fury explained, seeing the blatant confusion on her face. "After the Triskelion was destroyed, the cavern collapsed in on itself. Whoever created it and placed you there did so very deliberately. You would have been impossible to discover otherwise, which leads us to believe that whoever placed you there only intended for you to be awoken in the case of the building's destruction. You had been in cryogenic sleep for an unknown period of time."

"I was in cryogenic sleep?" Jane asked in disbelief. It was hard to wrap her head around the fact that she had actually been _frozen_—in a coma-like state, but just alive enough so that her body and mind were preserved, similar to how Steve had been trapped in the ice off Greenland for seventy years—only her case had been intentional.

Fury nodded. "Right now, the most likely scenario is that you were part of a Hydra experiment. Their technology was oftentimes the twin of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s, and it would be just like Alexander Pierce to bury you right under my nose. He would have found it amusing. Perhaps they were experimenting with memory wipes and the like—they certainly have that capability." He shared a sidelong glance with Steve, who didn't elaborate. "At any rate, with Pierce's death your experiment would have been halted. It's lucky we found you."

"Where do you think I might be from?" Jane asked. "In the picture Steve showed me, the year was 1943. But I can't be from the 1940s, because I knew that this year was 2014 without anyone telling me. And I know how the twenty-first century works. But how could I have lived back then, too?"

"That is precisely what we are trying to find out," Fury said. He spread his fingers out over the screen's reflection on the polished surface of the table, and the image behind him zoomed in on Jane's unconscious figure. She was wearing the brown corduroy dress she remembered awakening in, her dark hair spread around her head like a halo. But there was something on her wrist she didn't recognize—a bracelet? Her hand automatically went to her own wrist, but it was bare.

"Yes," Fury said, noticing her frown. "You were found with nothing but what you see in that image." He pushed something across the table toward Jane, and she caught it reflexively—it was a delicate bracelet, decorated with bluish-gray gemstones that shone like charms in the light and bound together with a silver chain. "We had to examine it, of course. It's adularia moonstone, which is a very rare and expensive stone today but was very popular in the mid-twentieth century. Unfortunately, it has no special properties and did not offer any useful information."

Jane glanced quizzically at Steve. "Do you recognize it?" she asked, trying to remember if she'd been wearing it in the picture.

But Steve's eyebrows were drawn together and he looked bewildered. "No," he said, shaking his head slightly. "I don't…" But his voice trailed off, sounding a bit hoarse, as if he'd come to a possible conclusion in his mind but didn't believe it himself.

"It had to have been placed there deliberately," said one of the other agents, a handsome man with curly hair. His partner, a brown-haired woman, nodded in agreement. With a jolt, Jane realized they were the ones who had been whispering about her earlier.

Fury settled back in his chair, lacing his fingers together. "Correct, Fitz. But as it stands, it shows no unusual qualities as of yet. We will continue to monitor it periodically."

"May I put it back on?" Jane asked hopefully. Fury inclined his head, and she looped the bracelet around her wrist while Fitz and the woman began to bicker. She prayed they would keep Fury talking before he realized that she was fumbling with the tiny clasp.

"Need some help?" a deep voice whispered in her ear. Jane tried not to shiver as she looked over at Steve, who was smiling crookedly at her, obviously trying to put her at ease. She nodded, her thanks becoming stuck in her throat as he gently took her wrist and fastened the clasp in half a second. It was a wonder how he was able to do it so nimbly; his fingers were twice the size of hers. His skin burned with heat—or perhaps it was just her. She felt herself blushing as she smiled at him, jerking her hand away with a bit more force than was necessary and folded them in her lap. The bracelet was light and the metal was cool against her skin. She was no doubt attracted to Steve—and what brilliant timing it was—but she could hardly blame herself; he looked like the American dream personified.

Sharon didn't seem to have noticed their little interaction; she was watching Fury intently. _Maybe there was something between us…before, _Jane thought. Was that why Steve was so hesitant to tell her anything? Maybe she'd found him attractive even before he'd taken the serum. And then Jane reminded herself that she had more important things to think about than any possible romantic interest. Her stomach squirmed with guilt, and she pointedly looked away from him, back to the front of the boardroom.

"The bracelet is not what we need to be concerned about right now," Fury was saying firmly. "It is normal, but her DNA isn't."

Jane's heart stopped beating. "It's not…normal?" she asked. "But I thought you said—you had done tests—"

"Identity tests," Fury corrected. "A thorough medical examination revealed that your overall health is identical to that of an average, physically fit woman. And that you may very well be. But there is a possible abnormality in your chromosomes that our medic would like to examine further. It is likely a result of Hydra experimentation and does not appear to affect your health, but we would like to take one more DNA test—with your consent, that is."

Jane was certain that they would perform the test whether she consented or not, but Fury seemed to be one for ceremony, so she nodded though her stomach was tying itself into knots. She told herself that S.H.I.E.L.D. would discover the abnormality and fix it. She had no other choice, after all.

"With all due respect, sir—" Steve began, sounding as if he was about to protest, but Natasha interrupted him, her voice silky smooth.

"Вы можете доверять ему," she said, and Jane understood her, if only barely. _You can trust him. _She turned around in her chair to stare at the scarlet-haired woman, a million questions forming in her head. Natasha, sensing her amazement, added in English, "Scans of your brain while you were asleep showed increased activity when exposed to Russian and German. It's a technology that hasn't been introduced officially yet. S.H.I.E.L.D. pulled out all the stops on you," she added, somewhat dryly.

"But I don't speak either of those languages very well," Jane argued. "Maybe just enough to hold a basic conversation…"

"Basic or not, it could prove to be a valuable clue," Fury replied. "Add it to her file, Simmons," he told the brown-haired woman, who nodded and scribbled something down onto a piece of paper.

They supposedly didn't know anything about her, yet they had a file on her she wasn't allowed to read. Jane's sense of discomfort only grew at this new development. "If I get my memories back, will you release me?" she asked. She was grateful for their help, but she wasn't naïve enough not to realize that they were doing it for their own gain as well.

"Yes," Fury said after sharing a long look with Maria. "If you agree to be monitored by S.H.I.E.L.D., then you will be allowed back out into the world. However, there is no predicting how fast your memories will return, if at all."

"If S.H.I.E.L.D. helps you, not only will you regain your memories, you'll find out who did this to you," added Sharon. "If it is a success, it might even prove useful to others."

Jane frowned. "So I'm not the only person whose memories have been erased?"

"There is one other case that we know of—" Sharon began, but fell silent when Steve shot her a sharp look.

"But I think my memories might be coming back on their own," Jane said. "I had a dream that I was a young child playing in some sort of desert." She quickly explained the memory—or what she thought was a memory—making sure to recount every detail of the man she'd seen in case Fury ever happened across him. Simmons's pen was moving so fast across the page that it was little more than a blur.

"The man was carrying blueprints?" Fury asked when she'd finished. When the answer was positive, he exchanged a long look with Maria. Jane wished she knew what they were thinking.

"Sir, do you think these dreams have any truth to them?" Fitz asked, a bit sourly. Clearly, dream interpretation had not been his expectation for the meeting.

"I certainly wouldn't rule it out," said Fury. "Oftentimes the unconscious mind has information that only surfaces in dreams. Still, if it is true, it means that Jane's memories are still intact, but just very well hidden." He turned back to Jane herself and explained, "Your treatment will begin tomorrow. Do you have any other questions?"

Of course, she had countless questions, but none that Fury had the answers to, so she just shook her head. "Very well, then. Consider this meeting dismissed," he said, and everyone stood up at once, most of them not even looking at Jane. Fitz and Simmons were the first out the door, still arguing amongst themselves.

"I'll take her back," Natasha said as soon as Steve rose from his chair, inserting herself between him and Jane.

He stepped back, and for a brief moment Jane imagined there was disappointment on his face, but he only shrugged. "Of course. See you tomorrow, Jane."

She smiled at him as she reluctantly Natasha out of the room and back down the hallway. She didn't want to go back to the infirmary; not now, where there was nothing to do other than read. She opened her mouth to ask Natasha if she had any other options, but all that came out was, "Are Steve and Sharon…together?"

Natasha glanced at Jane, her catlike eyes glittering strangely. "Why?" she asked smoothly. "Are you jealous?"

"No, of course not! I just thought…"

"Yes and no," Natasha answered, interrupting her poorly constructed excuse. "They went on a date last week, but Sharon told me he kissed her on the cheek and nothing more. Steve isn't exactly Casanova. We'll see how it goes."

They were standing in front of the infirmary now, and Jane couldn't deny that it was strangely pleasant gossiping with another woman about such a trivial matter. She twisted her bracelet around on her wrist. "Thank you for helping me," she said, and Natasha, her eyes flickering over to the watchful guard, leaned forward to whisper in her ear: "быть осторожным." _Be careful._

Jane was perplexed, but Natasha's face was a smooth mask. "I'm leaving for New York tomorrow and have no idea when I'll be back, but I'm sure I'll see you again someday," she said. "It was nice to meet you, Jane." And then she was gone, as swiftly and soundlessly as a cat.

Jane blinked at her retreating figure in mild shock before walking into the infirmary, mustering a smile for the guard at the door, who didn't smile back. She closed the door behind her once she was inside and slumped against it, at a loss as to what she should do next. She supposed she could begin reading the file on James Barnes—

While she was thinking, her eyes instinctively swept the room—and landed on a dark figure standing in the far corner, so still that he was almost part of the shadows himself. She opened her mouth to scream, but he'd crossed the entire infirmary in half a second: a cold metal hand clamped tightly over her mouth before she could make a noise, whirling her back around to face him. Jane stared, petrified with terror, into a pair of gray-blue eyes barely concealed behind his curtain of long hair.

It was the Winter Soldier.


	4. The Winter Soldier

Jane's first instinct was to try to fight him off, but she was hardly in a position to do so—the Soldier had her pinned so tightly against the wall she could barely breathe, and she was well aware that his metal arm could smash through the plaster with little to no effort. So she could do nothing but stare helplessly at him, her eyes growing wider with every agonizing second that passed. _Bucky, _she thought, though the name meant little to her now.

No, he wasn't Bucky. Not anymore. He was the Winter Soldier—the fist of Hydra. Where had she heard that term before? He had been brainwashed by Hydra. He had tried to kill Steve; had already killed dozens of people. Jane knew her life—what little she remembered of it—ought to be flashing before her eyes right now. But…he had spared her before. She just had to pray he would spare her again.

But what other reason would he have for being here if he wasn't trying to kill her? God, didn't S.H.I.E.L.D. have some kind of emergency alarm? She would search for one if her head wasn't locked in place.

His real hand suddenly relaxed on her shoulder, and before she could react he was holding Steve's photograph in front of her face—Jane had never been more grateful that she'd stuffed the file under her pillow.

"Where did you get this?" Barnes demanded. His voice was low and, though unmistakably American, was now tinged with a slight accent that Jane couldn't quite place. Thoughts were whirring through her brain at a considerably slower pace, as if the gears had been halted. She still couldn't believe that a bullet hadn't lodged itself in her brain yet.

"I knew him—_we _knew him," she rasped hoarsely, her eyes moving down to James Barnes's grinning, confident figure in the picture, and her smaller frame next to it, utterly at ease with one another. Her only option now was to grasp for whatever trace of humanity he might have left. "Steve Rogers."

As soon as she said the name, the Winter Soldier's entire body went taut, like a snake coiling itself up just before it sprang at its prey. Jane felt his fingers flex around her throat until his grip became physically painful—and then went from pain to breathlessness. Her flow of oxygen was abruptly cut off, and she scrabbled uselessly at his arm, feeling her head swim as her lungs began to scream for air. This was a horrible way to die, and now Jane wished that he had just shot her, or let her fall to her death on the stairwell, since being suffocated was not how she wanted it to end. Barnes's eyes were boring into hers, but he wasn't _there_: he was physically present, but his mind was somewhere else entirely. Whatever Hydra had done, they had nearly crushed him, if not entirely broken him.

But Jane found it hard to concentrate on someone else's plight when she herself was dying. Her vision was beginning to blur, colorful spots dancing in front of her eyes as the pain in her lungs grew. She pushed her body against him with all the strength she could muster, trying in vain to shove the Soldier away. The photograph was now a crumpled ball in his hand, and Jane's struggles slowly died down as she began to lose consciousness_. _"стой,"was all she was able to say, the Russian coming automatically, her lips barely forming the words as she used her last remaining breath. _Stop._

And then Barnes was no longer holding her, and something was flickering from behind those dead, dead eyes, and Jane was on her hands and knees on the tiled floor, gasping and coughing and shuddering. Her shoulders were shaking now with tears, loud ugly sobs that ripped through her still-burning throat as the weight of the past day—or was it _days?—_finally settled on her.

Barnes stood motionlessly over her for one long moment, and then he knelt down beside her, keeping some distance away, and watched her silently, his steel eyes tracking her every movement. His lips parted slightly as if he was going to speak, but no sound came out.

When Jane could speak again, she wiped the tears from her cheeks, the edges of her vision still not quite perfectly clear, and stared Barnes squarely in the eyes. Their gazes met and held, and something like electricity flowed between them, but something that was far more difficult to explain. It was the gaze of two people who had once known each other under very different circumstances, but now they might as well have been strangers. "I thought you said—you weren't going to hurt me," she whimpered, her voice rising higher in fear.

"Not if you cooperate." His voice held no remorse for what he had done—there was none of that momentary flash of horror Jane had seen just before she'd collapsed. His eyes were as cool as his voice. Something inside of him had shut down.

"But you almost killed me!" she cried, her voice rising higher in hysteria. She flinched herself at how high-pitched and frantic it sounded.

Again, Barnes's voice held no inflection. "I didn't mean to."

"So you don't control it? Your arm just acts of its own accord?" She knew she was toeing a very dangerous line, but she couldn't bring herself to care; she was still shaking with adrenaline. Even the voice in the back of her mind had quieted. At least she knew now that it wouldn't be in her best interest to mention Steve Rogers.

But Barnes didn't dignify that with a response; his real arm shot out and grabbed Jane's left wrist, his gloved fingers curling around the bracelet. She tried to yank her wrist away, but he was far too strong. His sharp eyes snapped up again to hers; belatedly, Jane realized they were the same color as the bracelet's gemstones. While Steve's eyes were the color of the sky on a sunny, cloudless day, Barnes's eyes were the color of the ocean after a violent storm. "Before you ask, I don't know where that bracelet came from," she said, watching his metal arm warily—at least he wasn't using that one. "I was wearing it when they woke me up."

He was on his feet before her brain registered any movement, and his hand closed over her wrist, yanking her roughly to a standing position. Jane thought of Steve pulling her to her feet so easily earlier, and quickly banished the thought from her mind. Steve couldn't help her now. She had to turn around and face fear herself.

"Why are you following me?" Jane asked, confident in the fact that he was, for now, eerily calm. When Barnes still refused to speak, she tried again: "How did you get in here?"

Before her incredulous eyes, he leapt onto the bed, and, as soundlessly as a ghost, ripped the vent off the ceiling, revealing a dark, narrow opening just large enough for a human to crawl through. So he hadn't gotten past the guard after all.

She waited for him to answer her, but none ever came. His eyes were as dark as his clothing, and she caught the metallic shine of a gun stowed in his belt. He had been, strangely enough, more talkative in the stairwell. _All I want are answers. _But even if Jane _had _known him at some point in her life—and all the evidence was pointing to that conclusion—he had given her no reason to trust him. In fact, the Winter Soldier, whether Bucky Barnes was still inside him or not, was the _last _person Jane knew she should trust.

"I can scream," she threatened, but they both knew she was lying. Even if she _did _scream, it would take roughly half a second longer for help to arrive than it would for the Soldier to shoot her on the spot. And there would be no help left for her at that point.

Barnes looked uncaring; in fact, he looked impatient, as if he wasn't used to having his targets take so long to comply. "You won't."

They both stood still, weighing their options, and finally, his stare turned to mild annoyance, as if he was getting tired of their waiting game. _"Go," _he ordered; it was clear he was waiting for her to climb into the vent.

"Why are you helping me?" Jane asked stubbornly. She was fairly confident that, as long as she didn't try to scream, he wouldn't kill her. Barnes would not have offered her an escape route if he was planning to hurt her. But she did not want to go with him. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is trying to help me regain my memories. Maybe they can help you, too."

And then, for the first time, true rage glimmered in the Soldier's eyes. "And Hydra infiltrated them," he nearly spat. Jane began to back away, rethinking her assumption that he wouldn't hurt her as Barnes strode toward her, spinning her around by the elbows so that her back crashed against his chest. _"Don't move," _he ordered, and she felt a sudden, uncomfortable pressure on her neck, so of course she fought: she flailed against him, but had misjudged the distance: the wall was flying toward her faster than she could move away, and heard the impact of it slamming against her head, Barnes's fingers still pressing against her neck. Pain sliced through her skull, and she fell.

* * *

_**1994**_

_She was back in the desert again, this time at the front of the house instead of the backyard. Craggy hills rose up in the distance, and there was nothing aside from a dirt road that stretched on for miles. The house was much smaller than it had seemed at first glance, but the car parked in front of it was black and shiny. It screamed of money and the windows were darkly tinted. Jane wore a light cotton dress that was streaked with mud and her skin prickled; she was uncomfortably hot. There was a long smear of dirt across her cheek._

_The same man from her first dream stepped out of the front door. He looked even more world-weary than he had before, dark circles etched under his eyes. Although he was clean-shaven, his wildly dark hair was mussed, as if he'd been agitatedly running his fingers through it moments before. His sandals crunched against the dirt as he walked over to pick Jane up, wiping the dirt off her face. She clung tightly to him as he carried her over to the car. _

_A young woman appeared at the side of the house; she was dressed in a loose-fitting, black outfit, and she was the most beautiful woman Jane had ever seen. Her red hair was the brightest thing in the dream, and Jane was transferred from the man to her. He bent his head close to whisper in heavily accented English, "I will keep the blueprints safe."_

_The woman nodded and murmured something in an unfamiliar low, guttural language to him. She reached her free hand up to touch his face, and he closed his eyes, drinking her and Jane in as if it was the last time he would see either of them. He pulled the woman close to kiss her on the lips, and then buried his face in Jane's hair; she twisted around to him, sensing his tension. But they had already broken apart, and the woman carried her to the dark car, strapping her inside while she began to cry. The stress on the beautiful woman's face was evident, and she murmured something again in that same language to Jane before climbing into the driver's seat and starting the car. The man stepped back as they pulled onto the road, the woman hitting the gas pedal immediately as they sped into the sun. She didn't look back, but Jane did: she pressed her hands to the back window, watching the man grow into a blur as they moved farther and farther away until he disappeared entirely, and there was only desert again. _

* * *

The next thing Jane saw were stars blinking above her. Her head was throbbing so horribly she thought it was about to explode, and it took her several seconds before she realized that the stars were in her own eyes. She furiously blinked them away, willing the pain to stop. Hadn't she suffered enough?

She was staring at a high-beamed ceiling, fans whirring silently overheard and dust particles floating in the air. Her vision was edged with red to match the pounding of her heart as she slowly raised herself up onto her elbows, noting that she was lying on a hard rug in the middle of a darkened room. Wherever she was, it was most certainly not at the S.H.I.E.L.D. base anymore.

The Winter Soldier was watching her, crouched down with his hands on his knees. His metal arm was the most visible part of him, and Jane had to look away—the red star was burning into her eyelids. His face was, if possible, even gaunter than before, and Jane would have undoubtedly mistaken him for a homeless person had she met him under different circumstances. He was no longer dressed in the dark uniform, but in a gray sweater and cargo pants, his hair tucked back under a cap. His eyes glinted strangely, and despite his haggard appearance he seemed more like a regular man than before.

Jane wondered how long she had been out. Either Barnes had left her on her own, risking her waking up—then again, it wasn't as if she was in any danger of escaping—or he'd gotten changed with her right there. _Maybe I do have brain damage, _she thought, feeling disgusted at herself. Perhaps the part of her mind that still held long-buried memories was thinking of Bucky as she had known him rather than the Winter Soldier? At any rate, Jane wasn't as terrified of him as she probably should be. Maybe it was because Steve only thought he was dangerous under Hydra's control.

"Where are we?" she groaned, watching him warily. He didn't move, only continued to crouch in the same position like a tiger ready to pounce. But as it turned out, she didn't even need to ask him: now that her eyes were adjusting to the dim light, she could see the room more clearly: glass shelves lined the walls, stuffed with what looked like old-fashioned artifacts. A rope ran around the length of the room, and directly in front of her stood a life-size cardboard display. Jane recognized Captain America, staring straight into the camera with his hand raised to his forehead in a salute. He was flanked by a flinty-eyed, dark-haired man who, though clean-shaven, she recognized as the same man in the room with her.

_Oh. _Barnes's clothing change suddenly made sense. He must have changed into civilian clothes to blend in—not that there _were _any other people around. It was either nighttime, or he had somehow evacuated the entire museum. Jane swallowed nervously and asked, "The Smithsonian? How did we get in here? Do they have a special discount, after-hours rate for hoboes?"

This entire day was making her cranky, and was so dreamlike that she figured she was well at liberty to say anything she liked. She had a sneaking suspicion the old Bucky would have laughed at her. As it was, however, this one didn't react to her in any way. It was strange that she could insult him and not get a response, and yet a simple name would send him lunging at her.

Jane stumbled to her feet, slightly pleased that her only pair of clothes hadn't been ripped or torn, and rubbed the golf-ball sized lump on her head. As Barnes rose to his feet as well, she mumbled, "I could have a concussion."

"You don't," Barnes said, utterly confident in his ability to render someone unconscious without inflicting permanent damage. He never took his eyes away from her for a second, Jane thought. It was unsettling, but she knew it was probably born out of years of training and assassinations: never take your eyes off your target. The file had said that he'd killed over two dozen people, all of whom Hydra had wanted dead. The thought made an icy lump of anxiety and fear drop into her stomach all over again, and the reality of the situation began to sink in. She glanced nervously around for any doors, seeing a red exit sign glowing about fifty feet away. Unfortunately, Barnes was standing directly between her and it. Unless something could keep him occupied long enough for her to escape, she was stuck. And besides, even if she _did _manage to escape, she had nowhere to go. She didn't even know where S.H.I.E.L.D.'s base was. He would find her before she even left the museum.

"You said you wouldn't hurt me," she told him, taking a step back toward the display. Worst-case scenario, she could try to hide, but it would turn into a fox-hunt very quickly. She didn't want to make Barnes any angrier than he already was.

"You didn't cooperate."

For a moment, she wondered if he was trying to make a joke, but there was no trace of humor anywhere on his face. Jane opened her mouth, ready to bite back a retort. She'd smashed her own head into the wall—not intentionally, but it _technically _wasn't his fault. But Jane didn't care very much for technicalities at the moment. "Why am I here?" she asked. Everything was so surreal—the edges of her vision were beginning to narrow, like she was looking through a long tunnel. Suspension of disbelief was the only thing keeping her from a breakdown at the moment. Perhaps this was all a drug-induced hallucination…

"How much do you know?" Barnes countered.

"Next to nothing, really. Just that I was supposedly friends with you and…S—Steve sixty years ago. And I was in cryogenic sleep." Jane flinched at the mention of Steve, but this time Barnes didn't react.

"Look," he commanded, and strode over to the mural, where he stood beneath the picture of the man he had been a lifetime ago. A glass case was displayed under it, and within a second it had shattered. Barnes roughly ripped out the photo album inside and stared down at it. Jane carefully stepped over the shards on the floor as he held it out to her. She was reluctant to take her eyes off him for even a second, but she could feel his piercing gaze on her, expectant, and she cautiously glanced down.

The album was opened to a page that held four photographs, one of them missing. Jane knew exactly what picture it had been without reading the description. _Rogers, Barnes, and an unidentified companion in Central Park in 1943, _the caption read below it. How had Steve managed to steal an old photograph from the Smithsonian? She thought of the paper crumpling in Barnes's hand, and hoped the museum had thought to make copies.

The three remaining photographs caused her just as much shock as the first had: one of them was of Steve and Jane sitting opposite each other in a small alcove. Steve had an open book in his lap and appeared to be sketching something; his arms were thin and bony. Jane's knees were pulled up to her chin and her arms were wrapped around her legs; she was smiling at Steve as if he had said something amusing.

The second picture was of Bucky and Jane. Bucky was wearing an old-fashioned suit—he looked like an old movie star with his wicked grin. He lounged carelessly on a bench, his arm thrown over the back. Sitting beside him was Jane, her legs crossed and her hair looking freshly curled. She stared unsmilingly at the camera, as if whatever the photographer had said bothered her. The real Jane noticed that her hair was much shorter in both pictures than it was at present. In neither of the pictures was she wearing the moonstone bracelet.

And the last picture was of Steve and Bucky. It was a close-up of both their faces, and though they couldn't look any more different, the friendship between them was evident. Bucky had his arm around Steve's shoulders and Steve was smiling hesitantly at the camera, his shoulders hunched and his eyes serious.

"I went to S.H.I.E.L.D. for answers, and I found you instead," Barnes said as Jane looked up.

"I apologize," she said sarcastically. Everything was feeling more and more like a dream. Jane couldn't think of any other explanation. The 1940's Bucky, wielding a machine gun and looking intent, stared blankly at them.

_He was a sniper then, too. Did Hydra know that and try to use it to their advantage? _Jane thought, watching Barnes out of the corner of her eye. According to his biography, he was born in in 1917, a year before Steve, and had a younger sister, Rebecca. "So you don't remember anything?" she pressed.

"I remember _him,"_ Barnes said; there was no need to elaborate on the name. "And I recognized you." His gaze was unflinching.

"But that's it?"

He took a long time to answer again. "I remember snow. And a train."

"A train?" Jane asked curiously, but Barnes's head snapped around, and there was suddenly a gun in his hand, pointed directly at the door. Jane saw the tall blond first, and she instinctively cried, _"No!"_

"You brought them here," Barnes said. He didn't lower the gun. There was evident frustration in his eyes now—he was staring at Jane like he had expected more from her, or that he was angry at himself for not killing her sooner.

She shook her head furiously. "I didn't," she said. "I _swear_." But before she could finish her sentence, he'd tossed the gun to his other hand, and there was a deafening clash of metal on metal as his fist slammed into a colorful shield. Jane had a split-second glimpse of Barnes wielding Captain America's shield before the weight of something much stronger and more agile smashed into him. But Barnes turned the shield onto its owner—he was on the defensive now, bracing himself for the impact—and Steve barely managed to wrest it out of his hands. Jane jumped backwards as the two men fought, Steve trying to grab the gun out of Barnes's hands. At some point the shield fell to the floor, and Jane snatched it up—it felt surprisingly light to the touch, and she quickly ducked behind it lest she get caught by a stray punch.

"Come with me, Jane," the stern, no-nonsense voice of Nicholas Fury said in her ear, and there was nothing she could do but follow him, and was that a man with _wings _pulling Steve and Barnes apart? But what most shocked Jane was that Barnes didn't put up a fight. He _let _himself be thrown to the ground. There was a cold, faraway stare in his eyes now, and Jane thought of a soldier resigning himself to taking a cyanide capsule. He didn't struggle as the unfamiliar newcomer jabbed a needle into his neck in the same manner Natasha had done to Jane. Steve's protest was audible even from Jane's distance, but it was too late. "Come on, man," she heard a new voice say in a calm, reassuring tone. "It'll make him easier to transport."

Steve said something else, but by then Jane was completely out of earshot. "…How did you find me?" she asked shakily, turning back to Fury.

He looked sternly at her with his good eye. "We had you fitted with an earpiece after your first adventure," he explained. "It's been tracking your location since you left."

Jane reached up behind her ear, and indeed could feel a slight ridge where the tracker had been inserted. "Oh," was all she could say; she couldn't even bring herself to feel relief for her rescue or anger at the invasion of privacy. She yanked it out as hard as she could, crushing it between her fingers.

* * *

Jane later had little recollection of Fury leading her through a fire exit and out of the museum; it was very late at night, or very early in the morning, and everything was pitch-black save for the lights of the city glowing across the Potomac. The stars were out, winking in their bright glory, but Jane couldn't take any pleasure from finally being outside. The night was hot and humid, and her hair stuck in long, wet clumps to her neck as they walked across the empty parking lot to a large military truck, which Jane was sure was armoured. A group of agents in dark suits were standing in wait, and they stepped aside to let her and Fury pass. He got into the driver's seat, while Jane climbed into the roomy backseat, which had four seats facing each other.

"I'll stay with him, Sam," she heard Steve say dimly from outside. "If he snaps again…"

Jane was beginning to feel nauseous; she closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the seat, inhaling sharply through her nose and waiting for the feeling to pass. But it didn't, and she could feel the fear beginning to spike again. The van tilted under her feet, though she knew they weren't moving yet.

"You're not the best thing for him right now." The unfamiliar man—Sam—had a current of authority to his voice. "Go sit with her. She needs you more than him."

A moment later she heard Steve swing himself up into the seat across from her. Jane assumed there must be a holding compartment behind them where Sam and Barnes were.

"He thinks we're Hydra," Jane mumbled, dimly surprised that her _you're _had turned into a _we're. _

Steve nodded grimly. "I know." At Jane's glance, he added, somewhat guiltily, "We monitored your conversation as well."

She supposed she shouldn't be surprised by this declaration, but she'd somehow thought that Steve was better than that. Jane looked down at her hand and saw that it was shaking. She opened her mouth to apologize to Steve for not putting up more of a fight, but there wasn't enough air in her lungs.

The world suddenly tilted from under her, and her legs turned to jelly. Jane slumped onto the floor of the van, her mind finally spinning out of control. Steve knelt down to help her, and through her blurred vision Jane could see him looking at Fury, who raised his eyebrow in the rearview mirror as if to say _Deal with it_. Clearly, this wasn't his area of expertise.

"Breathe, Jane, breathe!" Steve was saying urgently. Jane fought to keep her eyes on his face as the panic attack seized her, but it didn't seem as if she was in charge of her lungs anymore. Her breaths came out in short, ragged gasps, and she forced herself to concentrate on the feeling of Steve holding her in place.

"I'm sorry—I didn't mean to—he knocked me out—I don't know what he wants—we knew each other—I saw the pictures—" Jane couldn't get a full sentence out, and speaking more than five words at a time made her head spin even more. She could hear Steve shushing her, trying to calm her down, but she was too far gone by then.

"Shhh, it's not your fault," Steve soothed. He'd moved over to the seat next to her and had his hand on her shoulder, his thumb rubbing circles into it. "Nobody blames you. In fact, this is the best thing that could have happened. There's no telling what Bucky would have done if you hadn't found him. We'll help both of you."

Jane took great, shuddering gulps, impatiently wiping away the tears that had gathered in her eyes. But she knew that Steve was only speaking empty words, much as he'd bluffed earlier that day in the boardroom. S.H.I.E.L.D. couldn't restore her memories easily, if they even could at all. More than anything, she wanted to be able to go home to a family and a comfortable job, secure in the knowledge of who she was and ignorant of the fact that a secret intelligence agency managed the country's affairs and a ninety-year-old Soviet-trained assassin stalked the streets of Washington. Her heart rate was slowly beginning to return to normal and she could see properly again. Steve's hand had lifted from her upper arm, and Jane missed the warmth of it. She leaned her forehead against the cool window—the van had suddenly become uncomfortably hot—and tried to come to terms with the fact that all of it wasn't a dream after all: it was reality, and she had to either adapt to it or risk death.

She heard Fury swear under his breath, jolting her back to alertness, and they swerved sharply to the right. Something orange was dancing in front of her eyes, and Jane realized belatedly that it was sparks. A campfire on the banks of the river had gotten out of control, and people were running wildly onto the road to escape the flames. Jane shrank back, terrified that the fire would engulf the van, but as soon as the fire reached the water it was immediately swallowed up, leaving only darkness behind. Steve looked relieved; he had already gathered up his shield and seemed as if he was preparing to embark on a rescue mission.

"What was that?" Jane asked, dragging her hand through her hair; her fingers kept catching on the knots.

Steve sat back against the seat, the orange glow reflected in his eyes. He was breathing heavily as if he'd just run a marathon. "I have no idea."

* * *

Jane didn't see Barnes when the van finally stopped; the man called Sam had brought him out first, and after Steve had made sure her panic attack was completely over he went after them. Jane still felt woozy and unsteady on her feet as Fury handed her over to a bespectacled medic, who led her into a small office with a tiny examining table and took her pulse and blood pressure while tutting disapprovingly under his breath. Once it was determined that she was healthy as she could be immediately following a bruised scalp and a panic attack, Jane was released. Breathing a sigh of relief, Jane hurried back outside, eager to get away from the coldly clinical atmosphere. Fury, who had been waiting just outside the door, had been joined by Sharon.

"Hello, Jane," she said, smiling warmly at her. "Fury is just going to check on the new arrival, and I'll show you back to your room."

_The new arrival. _It sounded so impersonal. Just as Jane was about to comment that she would rather have Sharon assigned to her than Maria Hill, a loud beep rang out in the otherwise quiet corridor. "I want a visual on Barnes at all times," Fury said into a hidden earpiece as he strode back down the corridor without another word to Jane, his black coat billowing behind him. "You tell me if he so much as _blinks_, understand?"

Sharon thankfully didn't ask any questions as she led Jane not back to the infirmary, but to another room that was obviously meant as a holding area: the bed in the corner of the room (she refused to think of it as a cell) was covered with a thin comforter that might have been white at some point in time. The wallpaper was starting to peel and nails were sticking up from several of the floorboards. Someone had obviously made preparations for Jane to stay here; the S.H.I.E.L.D. file she'd stuffed under the pillow was lying on the edge of the bed. She almost missed the infirmary.

"It's not the most luxurious room," Sharon said ruefully, glancing around and apparently searching for something positive to say. When she found nothing, she added, "It's likely that you won't have to stay here for long. Once you get clearance for leaving, S.H.I.E.L.D. will find you an apartment."

Jane smiled weakly at her. "Thank you," she said.

"Try to sleep," Sharon said softly, and put her hand on Jane's shoulder where Steve's had been an hour earlier. "Just tell the guard if you need me, all right?"

Jane nodded and Sharon left the room, her businesslike mask snapping on the second her back was turned. After the door had swung shut behind her, briefly revealing the back of the same guard who had been standing at the infirmary, Jane took inventory of the room before gathering the file and sitting cross-legged on the bed, her back against the cold wall. She noticed with dry amusement that there were no vents in this room.

It had to be long past midnight—though none of the agents appeared to require sleep—but Jane wasn't tired at all. In fact, she was more awake than she'd ever been. She didn't even hesitate before she opened the file on Bucky, determined to read everything this time without shying away.

She was so intent on reading that she barely noticed when there was a soft knock on her door. Jane felt as if she had been pulled from somewhere else entirely, and glanced up, disoriented. Was it morning already? "Yes?" she called back quietly.

The door creaked open, and she was not surprised at all when Steve stepped in. He looked more exhausted than she'd ever seen him, and there was a faraway look in his eyes. Jane was reminded of the words Natasha had said to her: _He only ever loved three people. _But if she and Bucky had been two of them, who was the third?

"Hi," she told him, a bit confused. Steve rubbed his jaw and shut the door behind him with his foot before leaning back against it. "Have you come to take me to another meeting?"

He almost smiled. "Not yet. Last I checked, it was just after four in the morning. Fury will want to see you around seven."

Jane nodded slowly. So she still had a couple of hours at the most.

"How are you?" he asked, and when she touched the top of her head, grinning crookedly, he pushed himself off the door and sat carefully on the bed beside her. "May I?" he said, as polite as ever, and after she agreed she felt his fingers lightly combing through her hair. When they landed on the bump, his touch was so soft she felt no pain at all.

"The doctor said it would heal in a week or so," Jane explained. Steve pulled back and looked sympathetically at her, his blue eyes very bright. "Did he hurt you?" he asked, and his tone was unfathomable.

For a moment, Jane thought of the metal hand squeezing her throat, and then remembered the utter joy radiating from the picture of Steve and Bucky. She knew she couldn't tell him. Not tonight. "No," she said. "Not intentionally, at least."

Steve was noticeably concerned, but Jane waved him off, quickly changing the subject. "I saw the desert again, after I'd been knocked out. There was a woman with him this time. She had red hair…" Jane trailed off, fighting to remember. "She said something about blueprints, I think. I didn't understand the language she was speaking."

"Well, that's a good sign," Steve replied. "It's proof that your memories are still intact somewhere. It's just a matter of finding them now. Maybe you'll have to be knocked out more often," he said wryly, with a smile.

But Jane's amusement had abruptly disappeared. "I'm sorry, Steve," she said, very quietly. "I wish I could be the person you remember."

"Hey, hey, you changed," he argued, lifting a finger to gently tilt her chin up. "Change isn't always bad."

Neither of them mentioned Bucky.

After a moment, Steve picked up the file from where it was lying open to the page on the Winter Soldier's targets, ranging from the billionaire Howard Stark and his wife over two decades beforehand, to a nuclear physicist named Ahmad Ferdowsi who had been fleeing Iran five years ago. Steve gently closed the file and tossed it out of her reach. He untangled his long legs from the bed and stood up. "Get some sleep," he advised her. "Fury sent me to make sure you were getting enough rest."

Jane raised an eyebrow. "Fury sent you?"

"Well, I volunteered," he amended, his lips twitching.

"I could say the same about you," she said. "You look like you're about to drop dead."

His smile disappeared. "That's not too far off the mark," he said quietly, and turned to leave.

"Wait!" Jane said, hopping off the bed and blocking his path to the door. It had more fervor than she intended, but she didn't want him to leave. Steve made her feel positively, overwhelmingly _safe. _He watched her with some amount of surprise.

"I want to see him," Jane declared. "Bucky."

"No," Steve said at once. "He's unstable. He's not letting anyone go near him. He…had to be restrained."

"I don't care," Jane insisted mulishly. "He's angry at me because he thinks I led you to the Smithsonian. Let me talk to him. Please."_ I need to face my fears. Maybe then I won't have another panic attack. Maybe then I'll be able to sleep._

"And what will you do if I don't let you?"

Jane shrugged. "I'll do it somehow."

Steve let out a long sigh. He shook his head, looking exasperated. "You're still the Jane I knew. You won't go down without a fight."

"So is that a yes?" she asked hopefully.

He groaned and muttered something like, "Fury is going to kill me," before striding out of the room, past the guard. "She's with me," Jane heard him say. After a second of thought, she snatched up the file and trotted after him.

"Fury won't kill you," she said, a bit breathless—each of his strides was worth two of hers. "You're part of the Avengers. Me, on the other hand…"

Steve glanced sideways at her, ignoring her self-deprecating statement. "I'm going in there with you."

"No," Jane argued. "He went crazy when I mentioned your name. I want him to be as calm as possible."

"_Calm," _Steve muttered, but at least he didn't argue. "Then there will be a guard with you. You're not going in there alone."

"Fine, fine," she said, waving her hand. "Technicalities."

The floor was sloping downward now, the whitewashed walls growing darker, and the air was noticeably colder. The doors lining the halls were made of pure steel, and now each of them had a black-clothed figure with a machine gun standing in front of it. Did S.H.I.E.L.D. keep any other prisoners down here, or was all of this for Barnes? Jane decided she didn't really want to know.

Steve finally stopped in front of the last door—Jane was now positively shivering—and said something in a low voice to that guard. With a curt nod of agreement, the guard pulled back a lever, a dull clank echoing through the corridor, as if multiple locks were being unfastened, and disappeared inside the room first. Steve moved in front of the one-way glass, his eyes solemn. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

Jane was no longer so sure, but she couldn't go back now. "Yeah," she said. Her palms were sweating, but she couldn't wipe them on her jeans lest she betray her fear. She took a deep breath, which wasn't quite as effective as she'd hoped, and stepped inside.

If she had thought _her _room was bad, it was nothing compared to this cell. The floor and walls were made of solid concrete, and there was nothing but a small cot in one corner and a chair with manacles nailed to the ground. It was barely large enough for three people to stand in comfortably, and Jane had to inch past the guard, who had his gun at the ready. "This is horrible," she said under her breath. If Bucky had thought that Hydra was still running S.H.I.E.L.D., this certainly wasn't proving him wrong.

"It's a temporary cell until his psychiatric evaluation is conducted," the guard said. Steve's face was tight, his jaw clenched, and Jane knew he wasn't any happier about the situation than she was. He'd obviously lost _that _battle with Fury.

Her eyes landed on the man shackled to the chair in the middle of the room, his hair lanky and unkempt, chest heaving. His head was bowed, strands of hair falling over his face.

"I thought I'd give you this," she said, dropping the file onto the cot. Her voice scratched with nerves. Barnes didn't even look at it. She guessed that he was straining against his bonds.

Jane stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, at a loss as to where to put her hands. She settled for rubbing the back of her neck, visibly uncomfortable. The Winter Soldier—Bucky—finally looked up, and watched her with hard, unblinking eyes. He sat straight up in his chair, his feet bound to the floor. His real hand was, for now, relaxed, palm spread across his knee. Jane tried not to think about how long it would take him to break free if he wanted to.

"I didn't know they'd had me fitted with an earpiece," she told him. "I didn't lead them to you."

Bucky didn't answer.

Deciding to try a different tack, Jane tried again, making her voice softer and gentler, like she was speaking to an easily startled animal. "I heard about your memory loss, and I was just wondering if it was the same for you. I mean—getting flashes of emotion rather than memories. You suddenly remember how something felt rather than what it looked like. Um…does that make any sense?"

The silence stretched on until Jane was sure he wasn't going to answer. Just as she opened her mouth to babble again, he spoke, his tone flat and expressionless. "You talk too much."

"Oh," Jane said, a knee-jerk reaction, and blinked. "Well, I thought—I mean, I get the feeling that you were the one who used to talk too much." She looked over at the file. "You can read it, if you want. It might be helpful."

"I can't," Bucky said.

Jane raised an eyebrow. "You mean you can't read?" It took her a moment to realize he meant that he couldn't read because of his current position. "Oh. Well, they have to let you out of those sometime."

"No, they don't," he answered. Jane knew he thought that he was back at the Hydra base, and that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been completely infiltrated, no matter what she'd told him. She couldn't help but feel sorry for him, with that resigned look in his eyes. But this time there was a touch of defiance to it. Just like her, she knew, he wouldn't go down without a fight.

"They will," Jane said firmly. "I promise. I'll make sure they do."

But Bucky didn't seem to hear her; he suddenly went rigid, staring at something behind her. "You should have let me die," he said flatly.

Jane had no idea what he was talking about, but it obviously meant something to Steve: she heard his sharp intake of breath, and then he was tugging her arm away, pulling her out of the cell. "What are you doing?" she hissed. "I wasn't even there for five minutes—"

"Don't make promises you can't keep," Steve warned. The door clanged shut with a grim finality, and she heard the harsh grating as the bar slid back into place. Jane caught sight of Bucky's narrowed eyes as they passed the mirror, as if he could somehow see them, and she was frog-marched back up the corridor. Steve's grip was tight on her arm, and he only loosened it once they were out of the guard's earshot. "But they don't need to know that," he whispered, and Jane relaxed: he was on her side. He knew that the way S.H.I.E.L.D. was treating Bucky—when had Jane suddenly started calling him that?—wasn't right.

"So what are we going to do?" she asked him.

Steve's face was grim as they emerged back out into the brightly lit corridor. "I have a few ideas. And all of them involve you."


End file.
